Bike Races

Here's a sight that warms my heart!

It seems like my boys haven't ridden their bikes for a while, partly because the weather hasn't been great but also because Eli's bike was broken and I only just got around to fixing it.

The weather was perfect this afternoon at 24°C (it was freezing this morning) so with their fixed bikes both boys were off charging up and down the drive on their bikes. I pity the neighbours as the boys don't tend to do things quietly especially when they're competing in their own bike races.

Miles 4 Smiles Assembly

This morning I had the privilege of attending the special Miles For Smiles assembly at Joel & Eli's school.

The total raised this year was R40,375 (£3100)which is an amazing amount of money for such a small school. Last year as a school we raised enough to pay for four cleft palate operations so this year we should be able to pay for seven and a bit which is fantastic!

Miles 4 Smiles

This morning was a big one for the boys as they proudly donned their Miles for Smiles T shirts and set off to complete as many laps as they could in 2 hours to raise money for operations for children with cleft palates. The event was once again organised by their school and the boys had been looking forward to it all week!

Eli got off to a flying start (literally!) and took the little ones race by storm whizzing round the coned off track. The only trouble was that he didn't know how to turn corners, so we had to do a bit of quick coaching!

Cape Epic

Dean & Paul aka Bizweni Bundu Bashers finished the ABSA Cape Epic on Saturday in 46 hours, 29 minutes & 21 seconds having ridden for 743km's climbing a total of 16650 metres (almost double Mt. Everest). Their overall finishing position was 278th out of 598 starting teams.

To see more about their Epic Adventure see Dean's mountain bike blog. He'll be updating it over the next few days with more facts, figures and recollections of the event.

For now Dean is delighted to have completed the TOUGHEST mountain bike race in the world and to have finished in the top half of the 598 starting teams. No mean achievement! He's even happier to be at home with Paula & his boys!!

And They're Off

Dean's Epic adventure started at 09:52 as he and Paul rode the prologue of the Cape Epic this morning.

Visit his bike blog for more info: Epic Adventures With A Mountain Bike.

Caption Competition

It's Friday afternoon and you really should be finishing off that crucial bit of work to meet the deadline, but somehow you strayed onto the web and ended up here.

So, whilst you're here why not get involved? Enter our Caption Competition and see if you can make us laugh.

Give it your best shot, see what you can come up with and leave your entry in the comments bit below.

No prizes, just a bit of fun.

Inappropriate comments will be deleted.

Number 21069

Runner 21069 was out and about on the streets and Lourensford wine estate in Somerset West doing her first ever 10 km road race! Yes, it's official, Paula went and chose the hottest day of summer so far (maxed at 38°C) to face her biggest challenge in the Run For Life Road Race/Half Marathon! Having trained for nothing in particular for the past 6 months or so, she was never going to be convinced that she could enter this sort of thing alone, so her dear husband decided to enter her instead.

The Biggest Loser

On Wednesday, Zelda launched our 'Biggest Loser' competition to help some of the overweight folk in church to lose some weight and reclaim their health. Sadly, obesity is almost as prevalent in SA as it is in the West. There is a R1000 prize up for grabs and the members who signed up for it are very excited.

Weekend

This weekend was a bit different to the norm (whatever that is). Dean left at 4ish on friday afternoon to get to Swellendam for the Double Century 205k race on Saturday morning. Click here to see how he did. Meanwhile Paula was entertaining the boys at home. They had a great time visiting a friend and chasing the ducks before chilling out at home with a borrowed DVD - The Emporer's New Groove. Joel took his responsibilities as 'man of the house' very seriously!!

School Run

So here's the latest mode of transport for the school run. The boys are really excited about this new contraption (it's a Raleigh trail-a-bike), especially Joel as he'd outgrown the child seat a while ago.

I've been taking Eli to play-group on the child seat for a while now and Joel has been desperate to go on the bike again as I used to take him on it to school quite regularly.

Home Again

We arrived home safe & sound on Thursday morning after a great flight. Everything went very smoothly from the clear M25 to Heathrow to getting the luggage (all 120kg's) dropped off and getting something to eat in the airport. In fact, as we were eating our plane started boarding so we took a leisurely stroll to the departure gate. The plane took off on time and landed about 20 minutes early. Customs left us alone and Jo was waiting for us when we got through. We'd also arranged for Andy to help as we had a lot of luggage. The boys were great on the plane, Eli slept the whole time and Joel slept a bit and watched quite a lot of TV.

We're glad to be home and settling back into our routine. The boys are pleased to be back at school/play-group and we're glad to have some space again in the mornings. On Sunday we went to NewGen in Somerset West and enjoyed the service so we'll visit there again.

We're both back into our fitness regimes with Paula back into the gym 3/4 time a week and me back on my bikes. I've managed one MTB ride and one road ride so far which is great.

We'll post some photos of our time in Blighty and Spain in the next day or two.

MTB Photo

Here's a photo from my most recent mountain bike race, more can be seen here.

The weather was glorious even though the ride was tough.

We had a great time that weekend, see: Weekend below for more.

Weekend

We had a great weekend in Montagu. Dean was riding the big race so we decided to go back to Joel's favourite place 'in the country' - Farmer Koos's farm. We took the boys straight from school on Friday and enjoyed a fantastic lunch on route - just look at that view! It was wonderfully warm and very relaxing. The boys simply loved pottering around the farm and Eli was often gone for up to an hour making himself at home with the animals/machinery.

Petzl Adventure Nights

I had a lot of fun on Saturday night riding in the Petzl Adventure Night bike ride in Jonkershoek. Visit my moutainbike blog Epic Adventures With A Mountain Bike for more..

Recent MTB Race Photos

On Saturday I rode in the Vigne à Vigne and had a great time and finished in a very respectable time. For more info take a look at my Mountain Bike Blog.

Here are two recent photos of me mountain biking. The first is from the Vigne à Vigne and the second is from the Boschendal MTB Challenge which is part of the Cape Argus.

Cape Argus

So here are my official stats for the Cape Argus yesterday:

Time: 3:31:02
Ave Speed: 30.99
Overall Position:6925/28669
Group Position: 7/422
Age Position: 1096/3366

Cape Argus

I rode the Cape Argus on my road bike this morning and cracked a respectable time of 3:30. In truth I'm a little disappointed as I know I could have gone better but circumstance and my legs conspired against me. At least I know what I need to do next year to crack a sub 3hour.

Boschendal - Cape Argus MTB Challenge

On Sunday morning I rode the Boschendal 55k MTB race and finished in 3:18 which wasn't too bad for the first MTB race of the season. The course was very fast and easy with only one hill of note two thirds of the way into it. The course was also very sandy which made for some challenging riding at times. All in all this is the easiest of the MTB classics but a nice prelude the real race season which starts shortly.

Next Sunday morning I'll be riding in the Cape Argus
which is the 109k road race. Last year's post is here.

Mountain Biking

It's now just over a year since I made the commitment to ride my mountain bike three times a week regardless of the weather or whether or not I had anyone else to ride with. Early on in my new endeavour I would end up riding quite a bit on my own, but I soon found a good crowd to ride with and ride regularly with Paul (on the left in the photo) who has become a good friend and cycling buddy.

Caracal

Early on Monday morning I was riding with a friend along jeep track on Sir Lowry's Pass when we saw what looked like some kind of strange dog. As we approached slowly the creature stopped and stared at us for a few seconds before sprinting off into the bush. We couldn't believe what we'd just seen, it was a wild Caracal cat with a rabbit in its mouth. He was obviously off for a hearty breakfast.

What an awesome privilege!